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06 April 2016

Since shortly before the late deadline to register to vote in the April 19th presidential primary in New York, state Board of Elections spokesman Tom Connolly said his office has been fielding nearly 100 calls a day from voters who are "pissed off" about their registration status, for one reason or another. On social media, there are dozensofreportsfromvoters who say they checked their registration online recently and found that their party affiliation had been switched, which is disqualifying because New York's primaries are closed, or that that their registration couldn't be found altogether. We could not verify the details of the majority of those accounts, but the discoveries alarmed many would-be voters, most of them seemingly Bernie Sanders supporters. Sanders fans are already on tenterhooks over long lines at the polls in Arizona, which the Justice Department is now investigating, and polling place electioneering by former president Bill Clinton in Illinois and Massachusetts, which local election officials declared proper, among other factors that they argue have skewed the primary process for Hillary Clinton.

Apparently my voter registration (less than a year old) has been purged. Way to go #NewYork

At the New York Board of Elections, Connolly said that his office looks into all complaints, and though the volume has been higher this year than his office has ever seen, "I've yet to come upon any example of any kind of mal-intent or inappropriate change of a voter's record." (Emphasis mine)Rather, he said, the increased call volume can be explained by heightened interest in this year's primary and New York's newfound relevance to the nomination. As for the complaints themselves, the circumstances vary, but he said there's a rational explanation for each instance of seeming irregularity. For one, he explained that the complaints are largely coming from Democrats—"a lot" of them Sanders supporters. (There have also, he noted, been some Donald Trump supporters who are angry that they missed the deadline to change their party to Republican.) Because many voters only turn out for presidential elections, and Democrats didn't have a primary in 2012, it has been eight years since many people thought about their registration, he said. ………In another instance of New York state confusion, Bernie Sanders supporter Jonathan Carrillo, a Long Island resident who makes a living DJing under the name Jase, registered as a Democrat the week of the deadline and, last Friday, checked his registration online and found himself listed as a Republican. This would make him ineligible to vote in the upcoming Democratic primary. Having followed the news and online chatter about irregularities in other states' primaries, it occurred to Carrillo to record part of his call to the Nassau County Board of Elections. In subsequent conversations, election workers pulled his file and found that a 2013 DMV form shows he chose Republican when getting a license, something he seriously doubts."I think it’s very unlikely that back in 2013 I randomly decided to join the Republican Party against my interest and while opposing their views," he said. "I would never do this intentionally."

Am I the only one who thinks that this is not entirely innocent incompetence?